Monday, January 31, 2011

WHEN WE ALL LIVED IN THE CASTLE

From Mervyn Peake's novels. You will wander these corridors until you grow old, grow mad or grow a beard of Jewish/Rip Van Winkle proportions -- whichever comes first.

An old sketch circa mid-2000s i think. Still obsessed with that synthy taste in the mix.

GONE TO GORMENGHAST by tzaddi salazar

SKIN SUIT -- WHEN WE WENT TO THE Myth of the Human Body EXHIBIT

We went to the Myth of the Human Body exhibit in the AFP community suburbs of Taguig. The building itself (called Neo Babylon, i kid you not) is decorated on its facade with what seems to be precise stone cuts of the gods in aptly massive proportion. Atlas was at the top. He seemed so precariously tilted you feared he'd drop the globe.

The exhibit itself was a mix of bad copy ("the duodenum is shaped like a chubby eggplant" and "the exhibit over 20 millions people has seen!"), choppy and hurried tour spiels (I did some consultancy in the Met Museum and this shit would never fly there), a confusing video of the workings of a birth and amazingly preserved, mind-blowing specimens with divided parts that put the "uh" deconstructed the whole thing left you in a head-shaking, confused mess. Well, if that didn't make you self-conscious of your biological cogs and screws then you're certainly one tough cookie. It's easy to see how cannibals and/or zombies see you as walking lunches after all that.

My favorite is called The Red Man. A human shape with toes pointed and raised off the floor a couple of inches made entirely (or so they claimed) out of plastinated blood vessels. Also, the man holding the skin like a molted carapace in a gentlemanly pose is uber creepy. Gives whole new-Lecter meaning to "skin suit." 

It was worth the price though. And, yes, we noticed that Lydia's Lechon is one of the sponsors. 


Oh, and there was strictly no photos allowed inside with the specimen dioramas so all I got was this lousy pix with the exhibit site map. Yep, each system is divided into its own Grecian god. Why Hades is designated as the circulatory system is a marvel of shoddy analogy and PR contortion.

This exhibit runs til April, I think.

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

WITH THANKS TO AMIRI BARAKA

Yet another post-rock cookie. I know, I couldn't resist the title. It was just precious and bombastic and, well, atmospherically science-y.


BLACK ARTS WE MAKE IN BLACK LABS OF THE HEART by tzaddi salazar

DON'T GET ON THE BUS

When your bus driver's last name is "danger," you know the terrorists have been watching too many old Keanu Reeves movies. This is just pure and utter terror tactics. The fact that no group's claimed it actually suggests a misdirection strategy our formulaic military and police minds commonly employ.

That certainly pus a damper on my bus rides.



EDSA bus bombing: 4 dead
Bomb under seat of bus driven by Maximo Peligro

MANILA, Philippines—“Who is responsible? At this point all we can say is speculation,” President Benigno Aquino III said Tuesday night as he also disclosed that all intelligence agencies were in the process of identifying those behind the EDSA bombing that killed four, two instantly, and injured 14 others.


The bomb placed under the seat in the middle of a passenger bus driven by a man ironically named Maximo Peligro went off just before 2 p.m. on Epifanio de los Santos Avenue (EDSA) near the north gate of the upscale Forbes Park subdivision in Makati City.


The blast blew a huge hole on the right side of the northbound Newman Goldliner plying the Baclaran-SM Fairview route.


Makati Mayor Junjun Binay said the explosion was so powerful that it punched a hole in a nearby concrete fence.


“It appears that it was a big bomb that exploded but we’re still determining what kind of bomb,” said the Makati police chief, Senior Supt. Froilan Bonifacio.


The explosion shattered the windows of the air-conditioned bus (Plate No. TXJ-710), which was approaching the loading bay on EDSA and Metro Rail Transit station on Gil Puyat (formerly Buendia) Avenue.


Police said the sixth row on the right side of the bus sustained massive damage...

EDSA bus bombing: 4 dead - INQUIRER.net, Philippine News for Filipinos

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

TOOK MY DELAY DOWN TO THE SEA

Happy New Year! And for the start of the rabbit year i took my delay down deep into the abyss and came up with some swirly, airy sounds.

Check it out here: post-rock cookie. 

Or here it is on Soundcloud. 

YEARS WE SPENT SWEPT BY THE TIDES by tzaddi salazar


Thank you Sigur Ros, Sonic Youth, Explosions in the Sky, Set Fire to Flames and God is an Astronaut.